


Aftershocks

by cat_77



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Episode Tag, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Martin Whitly's A+ Parenting, Take Your Father to Work Day, episode 02.04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29209305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cat_77/pseuds/cat_77
Summary: Because you don’t just walk away after being tased that many times, despite what Bright might want others to believe.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 159





	Aftershocks

Dani cuffed the definitely more than a suspect and handed her off to the guards that had finally arrived in the rather decrepit basement. She would have thought a supposedly high-end facility like Claremont would have a little less clutter and a lot less mold but she also would have thought they would have far better security than what she had just witnessed that day. She handed Bright the cuffs for his father under the assumption that he could handle the man given that he seemed to be the sole person on the face of the earth that could most days. Also, she really did not want to spend any more time with one Martin Whitly than she absolutely had to lest she lose her temper.

Rhonda made some noise behind her, probably a futile attempt to escape the guards. She turned her attention to that as the other woman had proven to be both high risk and highly volatile. Sure enough, she had headbutted one and was attempting to kick out at another despite the cuffs of her own on her hands. Dani pulled her weapon and pointed it at her with a look. “You really don’t want to do that,” she warned.

One of the guards, the one with the possibly broken nose, reached for his radio and offered, “I’ll call for sedation.” He could barely talk intelligibly but had the benefit of a free hand unlike the other who was not about the release his grip now that he had one.

Dani nodded and planned to stay, weapon at the ready, until the threat before her was neutralized. Or at least she had until she heard a rather frantic, “We need a medic!”

The voice was male, which did not narrow it down between the two men she knew to be tucked in the shadows of the too large of area. She had heard Bright under all sorts of circumstances before and though he had a similar cadence he did not have the gruffness, which meant it was his father even though it also sounded almost nothing like him. A dozen scenarios played out in her mind, none of them good. A quick confirmation with the guards that they had the situation under control, especially with a third now arriving with syringe in hand, and she rushed back to see just what Malcolm had gotten himself into this time.

She found him slouched against some of the randomness that littered the space, heaving for breath, the damned golden pass in hand. His father was trying to guide him to the floor despite the limited range of motion granted him by the cuffs he now wore, which meant Bright had completed that task before everything went south. “What happened?” she demanded as she tucked her gun away.

“Well, it would appear that there are some unfortunate side effects to being tased half a dozen times,” Martin replied blithely. He had finally gotten his son to a sitting position, though he flat out refused to lay down again.

“Eight, maybe nine? It was hard to tell if some were separate bursts after a while,” Bright corrected, and Dani rolled her eyes at the need for details even now. His voice was raspy, barely a gasp of sound, and sweat had broken out against his brow. It was hard to tell in the dim lights of the basement, but he seemed paler than usual as well. Waxy. He held up the pass for her, and she took advantage of the act to press a hand against his skin to find it clammy and trembling, jittery and jumpy as though current still ran through him.

She shoved the pass into an inner zipped pocket because she wasn’t stupid, and then reached for her phone. “We need a bus,” she demanded as soon as someone answered. 

She must have pushed the button for Arroyo instead of dispatch as it was his voice that demanded, “What happened? And where are you?”

“Basement of Claremont. Suspect is in custody, but Bright got tased. A lot. He and his father are currently arguing over how many times,” she reported.

“I’m fine,” Bright tried to wave off her concern, but his voice wasn’t any better than moments before.

Martin knelt at his side now and tsked at him like one would a small child. “I have been called a pathological liar and you have nowhere near my skills, my boy,” he reminded him. He lowered his ear to the still heaving chest. “He’s tachycardic. Where is that med team?”

Dani wasn’t sure if she was surprised at the level of concern he displayed, or resigned. Martin Whitly was a manipulative bastard and his number one favorite person to manipulate was in less than stellar condition beside him. It was equally possible that she saw was watching a frantic father trying to save his kid as she was a psycho trying to save his favorite toy. “They are on their way,” she promised. She turned to Bright himself and asked, “How are you feeling? No, correction because you’ll just say you’re fine. What are you feeling, specifically?”

Malcolm’s head lolled slightly to the side and his father tried to right it. “Chest hurts. Hard to breathe. Both lightheaded and have a pounding headache,” he reported. He held up a hand, just a little, and she could see the tremor, all the more concerning as it was not the hand that usually shook. “Fingers feel a little numb, too.”

“Okay, chest. Inside or outside?” she asked. She assumed inside but also figured making him focus on the details and do a self-assessment would help keep him conscious until someone who knew what they were doing arrived.

Martin rolled his eyes at her, mouth open to say something undoubtedly derisive. Bright cut him off though with a curious look. “Both?” he asked more than answered. “She kicked me, but at least mostly missed the prongs when she did.”

Both Dani and Martin reached for him at the same time. Together, they managed to push back the layers and unbutton his shirt. There were two distinct scorch marks where the prongs had hit, as well as tiny puncture wounds in the center of them. More alarming was the blooming bruise in roughly the shape of a shoe across his sternum and lower abdomen.

Martin began to gently palpitate the area and she reminded herself that he was, at one point in his life, a decorated surgeon. That flew out the window though when he glanced up and said, “You’re not going to like this.”

Before she could stop him, he gripped his two hands together into a massive fist and pounded right in the center of Bright’s chest. Once, twice, three times before he heard her threats to shoot him and backed off, hands raised as much as he could. “What the hell was that?” she demanded.

There were footsteps behind them and she could barely make them out over the rush of blood in her own ears. Martin though, spoke proudly when he said, “Reset his ticker. Not completely, but forced it back towards a regular sinus rhythm. He’ll have some bruised ribs, but he already did, so no change there.”

Bright looked pained, as in even more than before. He rolled his head away from his father and towards her to ask, “Do I have to thank him?”

She smiled at the hint of an almost whine to his tone. “Not if you don’t want to,” she promised.

“Though I did just save your life,” Martin pointed out. At her glare, he amended that to, “Possibly. I mean, if it got much worse… well, let’s just say I stopped that from happening.”

He continued to ramble and likely lie as much as tell the truth, if he even had a concept of the latter. She turned to see who approached and let out a sigh of relief when she saw them. There was a Claremont medic with a full bag slung over his shoulder, Whitly’s usual personal guard, and Gil. “Please, get him out of here?” she requested with a jerk of her head towards the father figure her friend never needed in his life. Or maybe she was just projecting.

The more positive role model let the guard pull Martin to his feet before he asked, “Do I want to know?”

“His dad just punched him in the chest and wants to take credit for saving him, like he wasn’t planning on leaving him here originally,” Dani huffed.

“My son needed me and I was there for him,” Martin insisted.

“You are literally wearing a jacket you stole to cover up your prison outfit when you escaped,” Dani pointed out instead.

“And he had a pass to unlock the doors,” Bright pointed out helpfully. He sounded a little less breathy, and she hoped that was a positive sign.

“Search him,” Gil ordered.

Dani patted her pocket and advised, “I have it now.”

Gil just shrugged. “Search him anyway?” It was probably for the best as he had been left unattended for at least a few minutes in a place full of potential weapons and tools.

Whitly blustered and protested but it was easy to ignore it now that he was bodily being yanked away, the threat of sedation of his own offered if he continued. She did manage to catch an almost believably worried, “Please give me an update on my boy? He should be monitored for several hours after the reset at the minimum!”

She turned her attention back to Bright, who was actually letting the medic check his vitals, which was admission enough of his not feeling up to his usual less than snuff. Arroyo beat her to asking, “How are you feeling?”

“I’m f-” Bright started, and got a finger waved in his face for his troubles. “I’m tired,” he reluctantly amended the declaration.

“You can rest up at the hospital,” Gil promised, just a hint of a crinkle to his eyes.

Bright rolled his own eyes as expected. “Or home? Home is good,” he tried.

Dani rolled hers right back at him. “You were tased. In the chest. Multiple times.”

“And punched. And apparently kicked if that shoeprint is anything to go by,” Gil reminded him as well.

Malcolm shifted, and did little to hide his grunt of pain in the process. “Are you going to actually listen to my father’s advice?” he scoffed. For someone so well versed in psychology, he could be fairly obvious in his attempts to use that psychology against others, at least when the others knew him far too well.

Gil shook his head easily enough and even Dani knew he was not about to budge. “No, I’m going to listen to the trained medic that’s been writing down all sorts of interesting numbers about your readings,” he replied.

Said trained medic readily offered, “Even here, you’d be under observation for a few hours after a single hit, just to be on the safe side. Standard procedure. Some people don’t exactly bounce back right away.” 

Malcolm frowned at that. No, more accurately, he pouted. She refused to find it endearing. “I would prefer not to stay here, if it’s all the same to you,” he muttered.

And so Bright spent yet another night of his life at yet another hospital. The scorch marks and puncture wounds were tended to and his ribs x-rayed for possible fractures though those came back as a diagnosis of severe bruising only. Dani knew all of this because she and Gil took turns at his side throughout the night, mainly to make sure he didn’t just wander off of his own accord. Normally JT would also be on the rotation, but he was otherwise occupied with a newborn getting about the same amount of sleep as the rest of them if his texts were to be believed. 

As soon as the monitors came off and the doctor completed one final exam come morning, Bright was on his feet and signing the discharge papers to absolutely no one’s surprise. Gil drove him home and ordered her to get some rest. When she finally climbed into the soft comfort of her own bed, she really hoped her dreams would not be filled with the images of Bright writhing on the floor, sparks of electricity bouncing around him, but feared that was as futile of a thought as keeping him away from Claremont the next time a puzzling case came around. 

She texted JT the all clear and received a text back of both him and his baby boy giving rough approximations of thumbs up, his massive hand guiding the smaller one into position. She smiled, flipped off the lights, and wondered what fresh hell awaited her when she next awoke.


End file.
